


Bad Blood

by Daegaer



Category: Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Assassins, Families of Choice, Family, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-05-31
Updated: 2006-05-31
Packaged: 2017-10-23 04:04:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/246103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/pseuds/Daegaer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mamoru thinks he has lost his innocence but Ran proves him wrong</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bad Blood

"I want you to go to Germany," Mamoru said. He made himself look up from his desk to meet Nagi's still gaze. "There are reports of Eszett activity I need you to look into."

"I wrote those reports. I don't think the situation warrants my presence."

It was hard to look him in the face, so Mamoru did it. Nagi's expression was always calm, always quiet, always gave the impression he knew exactly what people around him were thinking. Mamoru lifted his chin and gave Nagi his best cheerful, optimistic smile.

"I want them dealt with, Nagi-kun. You're precisely the kind of person who could stop this easily. I _know_ you can do it, far more easily than other agents, quicker too, and --"

"All right," Nagi said. "I'll leave as soon as I'm packed." He walked away, then paused at the door, looking back at Mamoru's relief. "I'll be gone well before Fujimiya's plane lands." Dark humour touched his eyes. "I suppose if I were you I'd be embarrassed by me, too."

"Nagi-kun! That's not --" Mamoru started, but Nagi was gone, the door shutting quietly behind him. Mamoru looked down at his notes. It was precisely what Nagi thought. He didn't want Aya to see an old enemy become one of Mamoru's greatest assets, or to worry if Aya thought about Schwarz worming their way into Kritiker like a cancer. It was bad enough that Aya looked at him and saw his father and his brothers. What was he to say? That Reiji had been his uncle, not his father? That Suuichi had been his father, not his uncle? That his _mother_ had been a _whore_ who'd have opened her legs for other uncles if he'd had them? That if he could, he'd have a damn DNA test done, though it would tell him exactly what his grandfather had told him, that one of the brothers was his father. _Does it matter?_ Grandfather had said, so off-handed. As if the way the family had treated him was nothing, now he had his name back. As if the name had the same value when he was told in the same breath that he was probably a bastard, but he'd have to do. _You're a Takatori, that's what matters. You're my grandson._ Mamoru saw he'd scored his notes over with heavy, ugly lines. He threw the sheet of paper away and went to wash his face in the small bathroom set off his office.

"That's what matters," he told his reflection. "I'm a Takatori." He splashed water on his face. Aya _hated_ the Takatori family. So did Mamoru, most days.

"Hello, Aya," he said, checking to see he could still smile like he meant it. "It's good to see you."

 

* * *

 

"-- _and return your tray to the upright position._ "

Aya blinked awake as the steward put a hand on his shoulder.

"Sir? We're starting our descent. Please bring your seat upright. Have you fastened your safety belt?"

"Yes," he said. He hadn't meant to sleep so long. He brushed his hair back from his eyes and wished he were back in London. Tokyo wasn't his home any longer. He wouldn't stay long, he thought. There was no need, he was no more than a glorified messenger boy, after all, couriering documents from Kryptonbrand to Kritiker that couldn't be entrusted to just anyone. His mouth twisted sourly. This was supposed to be a treat, a reward for good service. Ken hadn't shut up about it for days, transparently jealous. Damn Richard Krypton, Aya thought, and damn Takatori Mamoru too. He'd do his job and leave. He wouldn't see his sister. It'd be kinder if she never knew he'd been here.

Baggage collection was a zoo, making him long to push people aside and simply leave. He had wanted to bring only hand luggage, but Ken had badgered and wheedled him into taking a suitcase. Aya knew full well that if the case didn't go back full of ingredients not easily available in London that Ken would make everyone's life a misery for weeks. Too bad. He wasn't here to go grocery shopping. Customs was a blur of tired annoyance, and then he was out in the crowded concourse, his almost empty case too light to bother using its wheels.

When he stepped outside the airport he stopped still, surprised by the sudden lifting of homesickness he hadn't even known he'd had. Everyone looked right, everyone sounded right. For a couple of days he wouldn't have to endure condescending compliments on his English. He looked around, considering. He wasn't due to see Om-- Takatori Mamoru until the morning. Maybe he _would_ take the time to pick up some of the things on the list Ken had slaved over.

 

* * *

 

"Aya," Mamoru smiled. "I'm sorry, I should call you Ran."

"Aya's fine," Aya said, his face as polite and blank as if Mamoru was a stranger. "Krypton sent these files for you." He handed the envelopes over, his eyes flicking away as Mamoru put them on the desk, unopened.

"I'll read them in a little," Mamoru promised. "I'm sure Mr Krypton will want some of them answered." He stared at Aya avidly. His hair was longer, pretty much the length he'd kept it in the shop. The same style too, carefully cut. It was like time had rolled back, the only difference being the miserable fury no longer in Aya's eyes. He was even wearing an orange sweater that made him look washed out. It had to be new. Mamoru had Aya's old one hidden in his closet.

"It's not my business when you read the reports," Aya said flatly. He paused, as if he had realised how abrupt he sounded. "My ticket's an open one," he said. "I just need to give the airline notice of when I'll be flying. You don't have to hurry to accommodate me, Mamoru."

Mamoru nodded, polite as well. The last time they'd seen each other Aya had called him "Omi".

"Maybe I should call you "Mr Takatori"," Aya said, his voice aiming at unaccustomed levity as he relaxed all at once with what looked like conscious effort.

"Don't be silly," Mamoru said with a quick grin. He'd barely stopped his response of _Please don't, you'd sound like Crawford._ Aya was all right, he thought. He'd made a _joke_. A hopeless one, but when had Aya ever done so before? His spirits lifted, and the smile became more genuine. "How's Ken?"

Aya shrugged. "You know what he's like. He wants me to buy half of Tokyo for him. Mainly tofu - he says the tofu in England is crap." He looked at Mamoru with distinct amusement. "Have you ever had English food?"

"No," Mamoru said, blinking at the sight of Aya finding anything funny.

"It's like sewage. On a plate, with potatoes. I'll get Ken to give you his opinion of it - you might want to schedule a week free first."

"Aya-kun!" Mamoru said, grasping his wrist. The words fell over each other, faster and more than he had meant to say. "It's really so good to see you! You look so well! I've missed you and Ken so much - Yohji's well, I have him watched, you know he doesn't remember us? I'd look out for you and Ken-kun too if you were here, you know that, don't you --"

He stopped as Aya's face went blank and he all but wrenched his arm from Mamoru's grasp.

"I should leave you to your work," Aya said, stepping back. He held up a sheet of paper as explanation. "I need to make a start on Ken's list. Let me know when you want to give me your files, Mamoru."

Mamoru was left staring at the door that closed behind him.

 

* * *

 

Aya went into the first cafe he found and glared down into the coffee that the waitress brought him. He'd been stupid and sentimental, suddenly faced with a man wearing Omi's face. Omi looked out of place in an expensive suit and an expensive office, everything so _tasteful_ and dark, the single spray of pale flowers the only light thing in the room. It had been like seeing a kid play dress up. He'd allowed himself to be misled, to see the boy he remembered, but Omi was gone. What was left was a Takatori, through and through.

He drank the coffee and ordered another. He was glad Yohji was free from the pain of memories, free from knowing he had a Takatori _looking out_ for him. Aya knew what Mamoru's care was like. Ken might have thought he'd fooled everyone, but who the hell believed he'd _wanted_ to go to prison and then practically be _exiled_? He wasn't like Aya, hadn't had the chance to choose to leave in the same way. Aya stirred his coffee with more force than necessary. Was Takatori laughing at him, at the stupid joke he'd told, as if they were friends rather than acquaintance and messenger-boy? He stood and walked fast out the door. He'd buy Ken's damn groceries and be packed and ready to go the moment he had the reports for Krypton in his hand. There was no point in thinking about Takatori Mamoru for a moment longer.

It wasn't as if they'd ever really been friends.

 

* * *

 

Mamoru folded the papers neatly. He wondered if he should leave the envelopes open, to show Aya he trusted him. Why bother, he thought. Aya had never been interested in the administrative side of affairs, and would probably think it was some sort of trick to lure him into having one split second of neutral feelings towards a Takatori. Mamoru slid open the top drawer in his desk and took out the photo in its cheap frame. In the foreground, Aya turned towards the photographer, watering can in his hand and for once a human expression on his face. In the background Ken was fooling round with a football while Yohji watched, yawning. He himself was shaking his head at all of them, badly cut hair flying around his face. Mamoru touched the glass with one finger, remembering Manx's cheery, "Hey, boys!" as she snapped the photo.

He put the photo away again. Manx was dead. Tsukiyono Omi was dead. Yohji didn't exist any more. Ken wasn't much better than he had been in Tokyo, Krypton said. Aya -- hated him. He turned the thought over, like a bad tooth he couldn't stop touching. He wished someone - anyone - else had come to Tokyo. Aya had tried, really tried, not to hate him, but asking Aya not to hate a Takatori was asking too much. If he could have kept being Omi, he would have. But being Mamoru meant he could do what Omi had wanted, only more efficiently. He could have criminals hunted down on an ever greater scale, especially now that he'd made alliances with people like Richard Krypton. And even if he did use people like Nagi and Nagi's friends and contacts, well at least he was turning their efforts towards good, away from evil. He might be making deals with the devil, but at least the only person he was damning was himself. He'd killed the weak part of himself so that he could do good, far more good than a whining fool like Omi ever could. He just wished he could have a frie-- Before he could change his mind he took out his phone and pulled up Nagi's number. Aya didn't give a shit about him, but at least Nagi was paid enough to pretend to care.

"Mamoru-sama?" Rex said, knocking and opening the door without waiting. "Fujimiya-san is here."

Mamoru closed his eyes for a moment. He turned off his phone and put it face down on the desk. What would Aya think of him wanting friendship from _Schwarz?_

"Show him in," he said.

 

* * *

 

Aya raised an eyebrow at the sight of his few possessions fighting for space in his case with Ken's shopping. At least he wouldn't have to put up with whining about how difficult it was to make a decent meal. He'd drawn the line at buying ten kilos of rice, though. Ken could just manage with what was available at home. He paused. When had London become "home"? Tokyo should be home, it was where Aya-chan was, where their parents' grave was. London had nothing of that. But it had people who were as slyly sarcastic as Yohji at his best, as innocently cheerful as Omi at his most determined, as solemnly silent as he himself had once been. It had Ken, Ken who had recovered from Takatori's tender care and learnt to smile again, and who could keep himself mostly under control, no matter what the others thought.

He'd buy just one bag of Ken's favourite rice on the way to the airport, he thought, smiling. He turned at the sound of knocking.

"Who is it?"

He hadn't got his sword, but almost anything could be used as a weapon --

"Aya --"

With a sigh of impatience, Aya put down the heavy ashtray and opened the door.

"Mamoru."

Mamoru smiled up at him, a touch desperately, and waved a bottle of whiskey at him. It had been opened, though not enough was gone to account for the unsteady grab he made at the doorframe.

"Can I come in? Maybe a goodbye drink together, huh, Aya?"

"You're drunk," Aya said.

"I'm a good little cliché, Aya. A tired salaryman needs a drink now and then."

"A salaryman. Right. Come in, then."

He stood aside to let Mamoru enter, wondering how much of this was an act. Maybe there was some mission to be carried out before he left, and Mamoru had been fooling people in the bar, or -- He looked up and down the corridor.

"Where are your guards?"

"Gave 'em the slip. They think I'm out of practice," Mamoru said smugly. "Glasses? Do you have glasses?"

Aya silently fetched the water glasses from the bathroom and watched Mamoru pour with great concentration.

"You shouldn't have come to the hotel," he said. "You're not exactly inconspicuous. Don't the paparazzi follow people like you around?"

"Only when I want them to. Cheers!"

Aya didn't sip his drink until he'd seen Mamoru toss his back. Stupid, he thought. Even though this was a Takatori he'd hardly be poisoned so openly. He grimaced and put the glass down. He didn't want to drink with a Takatori.

"You don't like it?" Mamoru said anxiously. "I'll order something else --" He tried to pick up the room's phone and blinked at Aya's quick move to take it away.

"It's fine," Aya said. "I just have an early start. You should go."

"Ah. It's me you don't like." Mamoru looked at him with Omi's ridiculously sad eyes. "I know, I know. I don't blame you, Ay-- I'm sorry, you probably don't want me using such a friendly name, Fujimiya-san."

"I told you, 'Aya' is fine." He sighed. Mamoru was looking at him like a lost dog that expected to be kicked. "Go home, Mamoru."

"You used to call me Omi."

"Go home, Omi."

"The shop's not there any more," Mamoru said glumly. "I can't go home. Another drink?" He filled the glasses right up to the brim before Aya could stop him. "They do anything I want, you know. I can't stand it. _Mamoru-sama, will we eliminate these criminals? Mamoru-sama, do you want us to divert the target's estate to charities? Mamoru-sama, things have been so much smoother in Kritiker since you signed away your soul._ "

"Omi --" Aya said in alarm, but it was too late, Mamoru was already crying.

"You said I wasn't one of them! You said I was Tsukiyono Omi, that you didn't see a Takatori when you looked at me! You didn't hate Omi. You didn't." He hiccoughed and shakily unscrewed the bottle again. "Go on, drink up, have some more. It's expensive. I don't have to worry about money any more. Hell's full of rich bastards, right? And I've got both bases covered there."

"We both need to sleep," Aya said, trying to wrestle the whiskey away. Mamoru spilt what was left on the bottle on both of them.

"Sorry, sorry," he said hopelessly, rubbing at Aya's sweater with the sleeve of his expensive suit. "I'm damned drunk. Damned and drunk. Naoe Nagi's the only one who uses just my name, you know that?"

Aya held him out at arm's length and looked at him. He looked pretty much as unhappy as he had when Aya'd cut him down after the eldest Takatori son had taken a baseball bat to him in fraternal fury, just better dressed. But a Takatori through and through, he reminded himself angrily, if he'd admit to employing Naoe. Omi'd always believed the best of everyone. Stupid. Stupid and innocent, despite his profession. He didn't look like a Takatori. Why couldn't he look more like his brothers, like his father? Why did he have to wear that horribly open face? It was hard to remember what he really was.

"Oh, _Aya_ ," Mamoru sighed, as Omi had sighed. "I want to be Omi again, I do. I want us to all be together, and to sell flowers for a living."

"Out of the back of a van, travelling round Japan?" Aya said quietly, letting him creep closer.

"It'd always be sunny, and you'd smile, and Ken wouldn't be angry, and Yohji would be able to sleep. Maybe in our next life, huh?"

"Ken doesn't believe in reincarnation," Aya said. Mamoru looked younger, the lines forming round his eyes less visible. "He's a freak that way. Naoe calls you 'Mamoru', huh?" He shook his head at Mamoru's faint nod. "Then I'll call you Omi. Or Bombay, if you want."

Mamoru shook his head, the hiccoughs slowing. "Omi's fine," he said wearily, and let his head droop till it was resting on Aya's chest. "S'fine, Aya-kun."

"When did your taste in clothes get so good?" Aya said, feeling him relax. Let him finally stop crying and he'd be easier to deal with.

"Rex picks everything out for me each morning," Mamoru said sleepily.

Aya couldn't help it. He laughed and felt Mamoru giggle in embarrassment.

"OK," he said. "You really _are_ Omi." Mamoru put his arms round him and sighed, the last of the tears fading from his breath. He felt heavily solid and smelled of the same awful kid's shampoo Omi had always used. Aya rested his chin on the top of Omi's bent head, feeling the arms about him tighten. It was kinder to pretend, he thought. They all had their own problems, and even if Mam-- Omi's were of his own making, they were still heavy burdens. Hell was Hell, even if luxuriously furnished. "Hey, Omi," he said. "I have to fly back to London tomorrow. I need to get some sleep."

"Want to stay," Omi muttered. "Won't be a nuisance."

It was late, getting him safely home would cause more trouble than it was worth.

"OK, Omi. That's OK."

He dumped him on the bed and pulled his jacket off. Omi was asleep even before he put it in the wardrobe. Aya sighed and took Omi's phone out of his pocket, scrolling through the numbers. He shook his head at seeing Naoe's name in the list of recently called numbers, and chose the next one down.

"Mamoru-sama? Where are you --"

"Rex. It's Ran. He's with me. I'll send him back to you tomorrow. He's all right." He looked over at the bed. His guest wrinkled his nose in his sleep and looked so much a kid, so _Omi_ , that Aya felt all the years fall away for the moment. "Oh, and Rex? Let him dress himself on the weekends, OK?"

"What? Aya --"

"Bye, Rex."

He hung up and turned off the phone. He'd never bothered turning his own on. Let them worry about their boss, they should know he'd be protection enough. He lay down and listened to Omi's little snores, not pushing him away when he rolled over and moved up close. He'd stayed with him the night they'd rescued him from his brother, had listened to his breathing all night to make sure he was all right. He could do the same now.

What else were friends for?


End file.
